


Thick As Water

by Kereea



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Gen, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-31
Updated: 2017-01-31
Packaged: 2018-09-21 01:20:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9525179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kereea/pseuds/Kereea
Summary: Tarrlok knows who Amon is now. And that's the tragedy of it all.





	

You know. You know from the second his hand twitches just so and you can’t feel your chi flow anymore.

 Bloodbending—familiar bloodbending.

 Noatak.

 You stay still and silent in the car, trying to process it all.

 Noatak, your brother, is Amon.

 You’re not so sure what that means—he’s a hypocrite, because not only is he a bender, but a prodigy the likes of which has never been seen. But what does he _want_?

 Is this an extension of his ‘everyone as equals’ ideal from childhood? Does he plan to remove everyone else’s bending and then rule them all? Does he actually believe in what he’s doing, even a little? Or is it all a plan?

 You’re thrown into a cell back at their base, your shoulder jarring painfully as it breaks your fall.

 Well, this seems like a more controlled setting.  Might as well get on with things.

 “You know, of all the people behind that mask, I never thought it would be you.” You leave his name out on purpose.

 “What’re you on about?” the Lieutenant asks dryly.

 “Amon. I know who’s really under there,” you say calmly.

 Your proclamation meets disbelief. Several chi-blockers openly scoff at the idea of you knowing anything about Amon, and the Lieutenant chuckles with a sarcastic, “Sure you do.”

 You notice that Amon does nothing. You smile.

 “Oh, but I do. His life, his family, I know all of it.”

 “What, you help that firebender get off?” a chi-blocker asks.

 Ah yes, the mysterious firebender Amon used in his invented history. “Oh, my, no, I never met him, I just know about it. All about it—even the bits he doesn’t like talking about.”

 “I think that’s enough out of you,” Amon says. It sounds bored, but now that you know, you can sense the stiffness, the strain. He doesn’t want you to say it.

 He doesn’t know that you won’t.

 No, you won’t ever give him that satisfaction. You’ll even bet he has “proof” of his “origin” should you contradict it.

 “Well, at least it was a firebender, and you told me it was quick,” you say. “Now a waterbender, they usually drag things out.”

 “So you’d have dragged it out, huh?” the chi blocker guesses.

 “Oh yes, and I’m not even the cruelest. No, the cruelest will hurt you, break you…and then fix you all up nice and healed so they can do it again and again. The police say that’s what some of the higher Red Monsoons like,” you say. It’s true; after all, a deranged healer went on a terrible spree for that gang six years ago.

 Amon is staring at you now. You can feel it. He always tried to keep an eye on you as children, too, and that’s how you know. You smile. “Of course, we all know this won’t work out in the end, anyway. Benders are too entrenched in the city’s infrastructure—the power plants, construction, medicine-”

 “All of which can be replaced,” Amon said.

 “For higher costs since they’ll demand more labor. There’s also the fact that you could never convert all of the power plants in a few weeks—I wonder which families in this ‘equal’ society of yours get to go without electricity for awhile?” you ask. “Or people without enough doctors to go around once enough _waterbenders_ lose their abilities.”

 Dear spirits, one of the chi blockers actually looks convinced at that. You’ve still got it.

 Not that you care about convincing these people. No, you want him to take notice.

 “Then again, why didn’t you get a waterbender to look at those scars, if they’re _really_ so _problematic_? After all, one simply can’t wear a mask _all_ the time—I mean, that looks like solid bone, how could you sleep—ahh!”

 The electricity fades. You glare at the Lieutenant as he pulls his wands away.

 “I _said_ to leave him be,” Amon says tersely.

 Oh he did, did he? You roll you eyes, “Yes, because I need to be in tip-top form for whatever it is you want me for, right? I mean, why present your _foe_ as beaten?”

 Amon reaches through the bars himself this time, seizing you by the collar. “You should accept my mercy.”

 You smile. He knows you know—even if you hadn’t before, you’d know his eyes at this distance. “You know, I think your men _are_ right, Amon. I don’t know who you are at all.”

 He drops you, but you saw it. You saw that look in his eyes.

 You don’t know who he is because you knew Noatak better than anyone. And he isn’t Noatak anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> Just posting some old Korra fics, don't mind me.


End file.
